Unmasking the joys of theatre: Vamos Theatre

It was back in April and we were crawling out of our third lockdown. As creative producer for Vamos Theatre, the UK's leading full mask company, I was making the tentative steps back to delivering in person at schools, colleges and drama schools. It became quickly obvious that after a year of working in little boxes online, young actors and early-career artists were not connected or confident in their bodies. Their bodies were stiff, wooden, and tense; their nerves and anxieties were translating into their physical character and storytelling. It was this observation, coupled with the fact that schools are feeling, quite rightly, nervous about pupils wearing and sharing full face masks, that meant I started to dream up a digital learning programme based on Vamos Theatre's full mask, devised theatre techniques, and making it accessible both in and out of mask.

mask.ED

We put this idea into action with the development of a new digital learning area on the Vamos Theatre website, called mask. ED, where over time there will be a series of modules exploring all things mask theatre. We kick off the series with Module 1: Using Mask in Drama. The skills base within the module is suitable for different year groups across KS3 and KS4, with an emphasis on preparing students for the demands of both the written and practical aspects of GCSE Drama, and all the content can be worked through with students either in or out of mask. The five units cover foundation mask techniques and performance skills including: characterisation, clocking, focus, countermask and internal monologue.

Mask exercises with Vamos Theatre

Wide reaching and multi-faceted

Each unit is presented through practical and interactive film, demonstrated by actors and using footage from professional performances. It is all supported by an extensive Teacher's Notes pack, as well as a PowerPoint document to support classroom learning. Each unit is full of learning points, techniques, language for learning and opportunities to practice skills directly related to the study of drama at GCSE level, such as the analysis and evaluation of both working process and final performance. This is done through discussion in the films and further supported with suggestions for theory practice in the Notes.

We wanted to make the mask.ED modules as flexible as we could, so there is no time limit on access. You can use it as a full half term of work, or dip on and out of exercises with multiple-year groups, whenever suits you, and use it again and again. We are still delivering Vamos Theatre workshops in person across the length and breadth of the country, and hopefully that will never change, but through digital learning, we aim to reach even more young people across the UK and beyond, showing them the power of mask, the versatility of devising, and how non-verbal theatre skills can inform and improve all kinds of performance styles.

Confidence

Most of all, we hope that this initiative can help young students of drama feel confident in their physicality again, something that has been eroded over the last 18 months or so. While there is perhaps an irony that we've looked to the digital arena to help counter this loss of confidence, I believe it hasn't been working in little black boxes, per se, that has eaten away at young people's physical confidence – rather an environment of social distancing, time in isolation, reduced physical connection and fear of physical proximity. By streaming these workshops into classrooms, using practical and engaging content, we hope that mask.ED will make our students confident and creative in their bodies once again.

For more on Vamos Theatre's learning and participation, and how to join mask.ED, visit www.vamostheatre.co.uk/learning